Paytm ties up with Aditya Birla Finance to extend finance to SMEs

Alibaba-backed mobile commerce platform, Paytm, has tied up with Aditya Birla Finance to offer hassle-free finance options to more than 50,000 sellers on its platform. The move is expected to help small and medium sellers to scale up their business, the company said in a press release.

Earlier this week, Paytm launched a separate smartphone app and website—Paytm Mall—for its online marketplace and is aggressively hiring people for expanding the operations

“We are creating an ecosystem which helps our merchants to grow their business faster,” said Renu Satti, vice present for small and medium business at Paytm. “Accessibility to short-term loans and working capital loans is often a major roadblock for smaller sellers which we are working towards removing.”

Satti said Aditya Birla Finance was setting up a dedicated system and infrastructure to cater to the financing requirements of smaller sellers.

“A majority of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) in India do not have access to formal financing channels. The partnership with Paytm also creates the opportunity for ABFL to penetrate the unbanked MSME space faster,” said Aditya Birla Finance Chief Executive Rakesh Singh.

The move comes on the heels of Snapdeal tying up with Tata Capital to enable its sellers and online merchants to take loans.